Part Of The Team
by hail-rowena
Summary: Submission for HPFF's 'Final Battle' Challenge. It's the Final Battle of Hogwarts, but how can Katie Bell cope with the atmosphere when her emotions keep getting in the way?


**A/N: This was my submission for HPFF's 'Final Battle' Competition. If anyone wants my account on hpff to confirm it, I would happily do so. Enjoy!**

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The four of us ducked down, our lingering breaths sounding like wisps of wind across the room. Down below, the bellows of the battle faintly roared, just strong enough to make the ground we knelt on tremble. I was one of the worse, clutching onto my broom with full force, sweat dribbling down my forehead to my lip, tasting the salt mix with my spit.

I knew what dark magic could do, even though I didn't receive the worst of it. The moment we flew, I knew that we would be getting ourselves into something that we had never perceived. As a Gryffindor, I was bold enough to curse it and press forward; as a human, I wanted to crawl away and rest in peace.

'Almost...'

My eyes darted towards Oliver, whose hand was hovering in front of him, as if we would explode into a ball of energy the moment that he released it. But this wasn't just a Qudditch game. When the time comes, it was going to take a lot more than a hand gesture to push us beyond. It was pretty much doing to take all that we had.

'You know what to do, right?' asked Angelina, once again tying back her dark plaits into one ponytail. Her voice was steady enough, but I could see her hands shaking at her glowing confidence suddenly wasn't enough.

Oliver rolled his eyes to this, muttering, 'Considering the fact that _I_ came up with it, I would say yes.'

'I was just asking.'

'I'm just telling.'

'I was captain too, Oliver. I know what I'm doing.'

'You were captain for a year. _One_ year.'

'Is now really the time?' I hissed.

While Angelina seemed relaxed, moving slightly away from me, Oliver was more taken aback. 'Point taken.' He then turned to Lee, who was still messing with his wires. 'How's it coming along, Jordan?'

'Almost ready. I had to find a way to work these…' Lee paused to look at the label. '_Batteries_… This Muggle stuff is complicated. Anyway, give me a couple of seconds. Does the plus go with the minus, or vice versa?'

'Opposites attract, now come on!'

'You know something, Katie?' said Lee, looking at me as he worked on his little project. 'You should really save that anger for the Death Eaters.'

Oliver chuckled, but my glared soon silenced him. I then tightened my grip on my broom and glared straight forward. 'Well, whenever you're ready.'

The next five minutes were left to silence between us, occasionally the hissing of Lee's machine causing us to jolt. Finally, he raised it up, beaming at his work. Angelina was not as impressed. 'It looks exactly how it was when you started on it.'

'So it was simpler than I thought. The point is, it's ready.' Hesitantly, he then turned to the three of us. 'You ready?'

I gulped, Angelina stood up, and Oliver merely commanded, 'Mount.' Angelina and I did so accordingly, both of my hands clutching the varnished wood. _Please_, I thought to myself, _let it not end this way._ Oliver then said to Lee, 'You go and get the distraction sorted. We need to surprise them on this.'

Lee raced ahead, but stopped for a moment, spinning around and performing a mock salute. 'For Potter.'

'For freedom,' returned Angelina.

As we began to make up the formation, Oliver tugged on my arm slightly. 'Katie.'

'Yes?'

Even though it was probably for seconds, the look Oliver gave me at that moment seemed to last for so much longer, as pathetic as that sounds. I got jolts going through my entire body, and my position on the broom began to slacken. But as soon as that look ended, the magic in it was lost.

'Don't get hurt,' he finally said.

'We'll try not to,' joked Angelina, completely oblivious to the moment that I was prepared to take with me to the grave.

Music suddenly erupted. Lee had set off the distraction. There would probably be Death Eaters pausing for a split second to wonder at what was going on, looking around for source and, more importantly, the little blood traitor or Muggleborn who set it off.

And that split second was ours.

We soared through the crowds, our triangle formation directly plunging into the people. At first, my eyes couldn't quite adjust to the speed, making it hard to see the difference between enemy and foe. I had constantly put up a shield around me until I could finally spot the Death Eaters; at that point, the stunning spells began to take shape.

I got one Death Eater, causing me to offer a cry of triumph to the crowd, but soon had to drop at least two feet by the jet of light that was aimed right at me. Spotting this also, Oliver got my attention as I began to rise again and boomed, 'Can we be a bit more careful, Katie?'

'I'm trying. It's not that easy.'

'Well I can't bloody look after you and me, it would make things -' Oliver sent over another spell to protect me, not even noticing the Death Eater from a balcony above throwing an instrument I couldn't make out straight for him. Throwing my body left, I rammed into Oliver, managing to make both of us fly out of the way just in time.

'Can we be a bit more careful, Oliver?' I chimed. Oliver murmured some sort of response before speeding ahead.

Angelina was now far from both of us, weaving her way towards the end of the corridor. I didn't see her as she swerved before us, but I heard a crash and I bounded towards her.

When I arrived, she was off her broom. Weakly, she stood up, but didn't seem to focus on her own injuries, or even notice that her left brow was seriously cut. She merely began to stagger over the the curtain before her, now ripped. 'Angelina,' I remember screaming, but it amounted to nothing. Angelina still walked slowly and finally crashed down on her knees.

Lowering myself to the point where my feet could touch the ground, I moved and attempted to pull Angelina back. 'What in Merlin's name are you -'

That's when I landed. That's when the bellows stopped and the silence took hold completely. That's when my body numbed. That's when everything seemed lost. That's when I knew exactly what it was to break.

'Fred…'

Angelina hand pressed against his neck, waiting for a moment, and then suddenly broke out into sobs. There was no pulse. Fred was… Fred was…

'_Reparo_.' The curtain that had shielded the now still Fred from the busy world around him now began to repair itself. They were both hidden from my sight now, covered by the bright hangings. For a moment, I wanted to remind Angelina that there was a war going on. But she was closer to the Weasley brothers than most. Possibly the closest. Except for Lee. I began to feel a choking sensation in my throat. What about Lee?

I marched back towards my broom. There was no time to debate on the matter. As I rose up in the air, I left two of my dear friends behind, and soon continued to move on. Things were becoming more and more heated, as the jets of red soon became primarily jets of green. Considering the levels that there were too the school, it was hard to get a true bird's eyes perspective, but the agility that came with my broom was still an advantage.

How many people knew about Fred? It was something I had to wonder. How many people below were fighting, not realising that they had lost one of the best things that had ever happened to the school? I refused to choke, since I needed all the air I had, so I let the tears begin to fall freely, hoping that the air would cause it to evaporate. Then it just became a matter of trying to stop.

There were rows of them. Tables filled with laying bodies. Whether they were dead or not was none of my concern; well, it wasn't a need I bothered satisfying. Instead, I moved away silently from everyone, under the pretence that I was preparing for the next step when the Death Eaters returned. But all I wanted to do was continue weeping.

This wasn't how it was supposed to be. They trained us up to be heros, but I couldn't even count the number of people that lay there. If we were such heros, then why in Merlin's name couldn't we save them? Why were they there, when, the truth was, they were the heros. The ones who died for us.

A group passed me; I begged for them just to move on, but a Ravenclaw, Emily Hardew, noticed me and asked, 'How are you holding up, Katie?'

What kind of question was that? And from a _Ravenclaw_? I merely turned my head away, quietly saying, 'I'm fine.'

'Well, I just thought, because -'

'Because of Fred?' I hastily finished. 'Well, yes, of course it's sad. Frankly -'

'Fred?'

I made eye contact with her at this point. 'You weren't talking about Fred?' But what I really wanted to ask was, 'Who _were_ you talking about?'

'Well…' Emily was now looking around at her friends. This was clearly going to be a case of 'don't shoot the messenger'. 'Well… I was talking about Oliver.'

I paused.

I breathed.

I ran.

Up the stairs. Down the corridor. Into the Great Hall. I halted. I looked. I couldn't find. I wanted to die. My breathing quickened. My veins could explode any second. My eyesight weakened. Fingers tingling. Legs numbing. Knees buckling. The crowd. The looks. The cries. Darkness. No, I don't want to - silence.

_Oliver…_

When I first began to wake up, I didn't want to open my eyes. The thought of waking up on the cool wood, possibly surrounded by the dead, scared me out of my wits. While my eyes remained closed, I could be anywhere I wanted to be. And, as of right now, I wanted to keep my eyes closed. That way, I could imagine a completely different scene. I could be laid on my own bed in my dormitory, under the plush cushions.

Then it hit me. It wasn't just imaginary. I was on a mattress. This wasn't the table. This suddenly felt odder by the second. If I wasn't on a table in the Great Hall, then were exactly was I?

My eyes flickering open, I saw a surrounding that was far too familiar to me: the Hospital Wing. Granted, the occupants with me were far more different than any I had encountered after some Quidditch injury, but it was still the same drapery and whitewash walls. When I had taken it in, I looked a far brighter Angelina Johnson, though her eyes gave away the state that she truly was.

'You only usually get the chance to fight in one final war,' began Angelina, rolling her eyes, 'and you went and fainted.'

'You mean…' I couldn't find the words to describe it. I was only gaping at her in disbelief while I searched for what to say next.

Luckily, she finished it for me. 'We've won, Katie.'

Was it selfish that I wasn't jumping with glee? Probably. But as soon as I remembered what exactly the end of the war entailed, I always remembered what the war itself had caused. Angelina immediately came to my rescue; I was probably growing pale again.

'O-Oliver,' I finally managed to splutter.

Angelina nodded solemnly. 'Of course.' And then, she left me. I wanted to cry out to her, but my mind was too busy to think of the volume, causing me to merely whisper it. Perhaps she took it as a sign of me wanting to be alone, but any good friend would have asked to stay. After all, he was her friend, too. We were friends.

So why did I faint?

Before I knew it, I was trying harder than ever. It was as if my subconscious was finally catching up on me. The eye contact, the moments, the odd behaviour. I just interpreted it as an abnormality, but it was so much more than that. And I had to leave it at that. Because I had lost him.

… Or _not_…

He stood before me, leaning on a crutch while grinning at me, though it soon faded as he saw my rampant tears.

Though I wanted to leap up and embrace him immediately, another emotion inside of me bubbled, causing a less welcoming reaction than I expected, only for me then to shout out, 'You're leg. That's _it_?'

Oliver frowned. 'Hey, it bloody hurts. It's worse than feeling a little dizzy.'

Climbing out of my bed, my eyes still looked elsewhere, as if that was going to be a way to search for my recent epiphany as it flew out of the window. 'They - she - _Emily._' Answering Oliver's look of utter confusion, I said, 'She told me about you. She said - I thought you were dead.' And the tears came again. Much to my surprised, Oliver smiled after a few seconds, causing me to demand, 'What?'

'That was why you fainted?' I caught Angelina slowly moving away from the room. Oliver was now laughing, trying to make his way towards me. 'You fainted because you thought I was dead?'

'It's not funny,' I exclaimed. 'You were dead. Of course I was upset.'

'Like… you were going to miss me?'

Suddenly, I saw that I had been trapped. And I had placed myself right in it. 'No…'

'Katie, admit it. You would have missed me.'

'Of course I would've missed you, Oliver. Don't be stupid.'

'But more than anyone else?'

Wasn't I just getting upset about the fact that I could never tell him what I had _just_ realised? Wasn't that the problem just a second ago? So why was I hiding from it now? But even as I was trying to defy myself, I still wanted to keep it quiet. 'I don't think I can really say that.'

'Admit it.'

'No.'

'Admit it.'

'No.'

'Admit it.'

'Why?'

Oliver's smiled more broadly than imaginable. 'Come on, then.'

'Where?'

'Listen.' My ears began to pinch as I heard the singing flooding through the school. Oliver then said, 'We've got to celebrate.'

'With your leg?' I asked, trying not to sound concerned.

'You'll take care of me.'

As we walked away, I fought back the urge to reply that I will. I probably always will.


End file.
